I've just realised that there's something in CM that doesn't seem to make sense to me - the top speed of ships. I'm no physicist, so bear with me, but "thrust" in the game seems to just refer to acceleration, and has no effect on top speed. More weight = less thrust, more engines = more thrust, obviously, but where does top speed come into this? All ships seen to have the same maximum speed, regardless of their thrust rating. A CM figher might take 3 or 4 turns to reach its max speed, and a bomber might take 6 or 7 turns, but they both end up going at the same speed. Surely the fighter would have the capacity to reach a higher top speed as it has more thrust...? Or does space not work like that because it's space? In real life, a small-engined car with low "thrust" has a much lower top speed than a large-engined one.

Also, I've just screwed up in the CMT designs manager and somehow managed to delete the Water Tanker Could someone please use theirs to change it from a built-in to a custom and stick it on their website so I can download it? Thanks!

Actually that's not wrong. Concerning cars this works out since the engine has to compensate for friction (the tires rolling make the car get slower, as well as air hitting the car head on), while in space there is (virtually) no friction theoretically limiting speed only to the speed of light. Though I don't think light speed would be very practicable the amount of thrust doesn't actually determine a top-speed of a spacecraft.
Besides I like this the way it is...

I think a fighter should be able to nearly match the speed of a dark blue missile - the name if which is evading me, having just gotten home form a 14 hour day of....construction! w0rd. But yeah. I think I should be allowed to run straight away from a missile and have it nearly not catch me. Or have a once-per-20-turn nos button. So you can have like...three turns of super-duper high speed. Actually, I'm just throwing out ideas cuz I'm tired, but feel free to read them! Actually, you already have! w00t.

TheKangaroo wrote:the amount of thrust doesn't actually determine a top-speed of a spacecraft.

So in "real life" every spacecraft has the same theoretical top speed, it's just a case of how long it takes to get to it?

I don't think that any ship should be so fast as to be able to out-run a missile in a straight line, but I do think that it would be more realistic somehow if fighters could have a higher top speed than bombers.

...but bombers in "real life" are slower than fighters, since they have to carry heavier ordnance. I know that in space this doesn't necessarily matter, but in my opinion it would somehow feel more "right" if fighters were quicker than bombers - after all, isn't their speed and agility what makes them fighters?

Well, we could talk about that till the cows come home. They still differ from the 'bombers' due to maneuverability, sensors and payload and anyway we all draw that line ourselves. I guess I could take topspeeds being mass-depending, too, I'm just not as enthusiastic.

I'm just going for "playability", and think that fighters should have a greater top-end than bombers. Otherwise you could just design a "perfect" fighter, then copy it and change all its Daycorns and Geenees for Plectrons and Oriks. The ship has the same thrust/turn/stealth/radar characteristics but now has a bomb load rather than an "air-to-air" load. I think that that decreases the realism, and therefore the playability, a bit. I like to see *some* link between the game and reality (even though we're flying fighters with Critical Mass engines in outer space! )